


you have me right where i want me

by julietcapulet



Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, Teacher-Student Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-10
Updated: 2013-06-10
Packaged: 2017-12-14 12:08:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/836707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/julietcapulet/pseuds/julietcapulet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lovestruck college freshman Gyda Lothbrok writes a fanfiction about herself and a certain theology professor. Which is harmless, until he finds it in the hallway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	you have me right where i want me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ztannas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ztannas/gifts).



> **Title** : you have me right where i want me  
>  **Fandom** : Vikings.  
>  **Rating** : M.  
>  **Pairing(s)** : Athelstan/Gyda.  
>  **Word Count** : 3291.  
>  **Warnings** : Age gap between the two; Gyda is eighteen, Athelstan is thirty-two. If it squicks you, heed the warning and don't read.  
>  **Additional** : Special thanks to my prompter, [Pippa](http://archiveofourown.org/users/airyclaire), who both gave me this idea and also allowed me to steal "Professor Lindisfarne" from her. ;)

This isn’t how you wanted him to find out. Granted, you hadn’t wanted him to find out at _all_ (but given the infinite possible scenarios in which he does, by a stroke of cruel fate, happen to find out, this is, decidedly, among the worst).

You’re standing outside his office, now, waiting penitently for justice to be served, for action to be taken (for “boundaries to be established”, according to his email). He’s not here yet. He hasn’t been here for thirty minutes past when he _said_ he was going to be here, and you think to yourself, really, that’s just cruel (isn’t he a gentleman, like you think he is? doesn’t he know it isn’t polite to keep a girl waiting? especially a girl convicted of– well– whatever it is you’re convicted of– though, no, to be fair to yourself you’re not really _convicted_ , not yet, you’re just sort of in limbo between professed guilt and appropriated punishment).

At any rate, you don’t think you’re nervous anymore. The knot of burbling hot steel that was hitherto threatening the inner sanctity of your being has since coagulated and simmered down to a low boil, and you’re fairly certain you now have the strength to make it out of this without losing any of your innards (your mother would never sink as low as this and you must be your mother today, you remind yourself caustically; she shines in adversity, and even when she is wrong she is terrifying and feral and you almost _want_ her to be right just so she’ll spare you the threat of evisceration in her gaze). It’s just that he should _be_ here by now and the fact that he isn’t is extremely irritating. The sooner the better, that’s always been your mother’s philosophy; quick, like a band-aid.

But when you finally hear his footsteps down the hall (you know they’re his footsteps, you’d know the sound of them anywhere; a light padding cadence that bounces softly off the walls; the click-clack of his dress shoes against the stiff linoleum; you wonder if it’s creepy that you know reflexively every nuance in his step; you decide that it _is_ creepy, and now you’re blushing by the time he’s reached you and) you feel the hot coal inside your throat plummet down to your belly and reignite the flame that had only just been extinguished– the steel bubbles and smolders and you feel as if you’re going to burst with it, that if he were to cut you open right now your blood wouldn’t be blood, but metal– and now, you’re sure, that no matter how much willpower you may have coaxed yourself into believing you had, you’re going to be sick.

“Miss Lothbrok,” he says, clearing his throat. Despite the fact that it’s your name it’s probably the worst sound you’ve ever heard in your entire life.

“Professor Lindisfarne,” you somehow manage to say, even though your voice doesn’t sound like it’s coming from you at all.

“If you would come into my office, please,” your professor invites, holding the door open for you as pleasantly and politely as any prince would from one of your favorite stories as a girl (but you can’t think about a thing like that, not now).

His office is, naturally, impeccable. Every book is alphabetized, every shelf dusted, every pencil sharpened; it seems that everything is at a ninety degree angle, fixed around the focal point that is his desk. Nothing is out of place. Nothing, that is, except you. You don’t fit into his angular little world. You’re a shape of indeterminate curves and edges and he can’t make logic out of something that is, inherently, illogical (erroneous, misplaced, mislaid, improbable, dubious, and lots of other words you learned for the SAT– you got a 2240 on the SAT, which, incidentally, is much better than Bjorn’s score– but why are you thinking about that _now_?). Focus. You need to focus. Maybe if you focus you won’t throw up all over his perfectly coiffed rug.

When he speaks, it’s soft and resolute; he’s made his decision regarding your fate. This isn’t a trial, it’s a verdict. “I can’t help but feel you are owed an apology,” he says, and your breath catches in your throat. This isn’t how verdicts typically go. “I know this must be a very… sensitive situation for you.”

“I’m just stupid,” you say, the words tumbling out of your mouth before you can stop them (you’re not trying to get pity, you’re not, but you’re both thinking it and it needs to be said). “It’s okay. You don’t have to apologize.”

“No, Gyda- " he starts to say, catches himself, backtracks, “ – _Miss Lothbrok_ – you’re not stupid. These things… happen. It’s alright.”

“Only in nightmares,” you counter, and he can’t argue with that.

He has to pause, recalibrate, find a new approach. But the cogs in his head hitch, freeze, and grind against each other uselessly. He has no idea what to say and neither do you, so you just stare at the ground instead and he stares at his hands and nothing happens. Until,

“I’m sorry if you feel that I- " he pauses, swallows, “–encouraged you in any way, but you must know that if I did it was quite, _quite_ unintentional.”

“Of course,” and there’s a wobble in your voice that betrays you (because how could he say that, how could he sit there and say that knowing how much it hurts you to hear it? though, you suppose he has to _say_ that, and maybe it’s possible that he feels something else, and maybe, maybe this is all a formality and– you’re skirting fantasy again, you remind yourself, with chagrin, and drag your mind unhappily back to reality).

“It would be unethical for me to abuse my position in such a way, you understand."

“Yes.”

But you don’t understand, you just think you do, because thinking you do is better than admitting you don’t (you understand the morality behind the issue, but you don’t understand how it would be an abuse of power, how the love between two individuals could be seen as wrong, especially between two consenting adults, and– no, you can’t let yourself start thinking these thoughts again, you’ve got to bury them six feet underground, right alongside your dignity). There’s a piece of hair tickling your ear and you tuck it back absently, relishing the excuse it gives you to do something with your hands other than twist them around anxiously in your lap. You wish you could disappear (and you’ve wished that a thousand times before, but this time it’s a more fervent wish than ever because you actually, really, _truly_ mean it, not in the hyperbolic teenage way of your past). But you’re stuck, a fixed point on a static axis, and Professor Lindisfarne is the perpendicular axis, crossing through your path in an opposite direction, meeting only at one point, forming four angles of the same degree (a right angle, incidentally, which is ninety degrees, a perfect ninety degrees, like all the other angles in his office, and so perhaps you _do_ fit after all, which would make you smile if you didn’t know better, but you do know better, because you’re the smart one in your family).

“So, I suppose my question is, why did you… well, why did you write… this? Which, not to say it isn’t well written because, as I’m sure your other professors have told you, you’re great at writing fiction, and I know we’ve discussed your future interests in pursuing a career as a fiction writer, so– yes, the question, my question, is the point, and that question is, again, why did you write this?”

“I– didn’t know what else to do,” you tell him, earnestly, voice quivering slightly (but just slightly enough for him to notice, and you can tell he notices by the way the corner of his lip twitches when he hears it, as if he is going to say something but stops himself because he doesn’t really know _what_ he wants to say, only that he wants to say _something_ ). “I, I had feelings, and words, and nowhere to put them. It wasn’t– “ your voice cracks, and soon you won’t be able to stop it from shattering altogether, “–it wasn’t meant for anyone to see. Just me.”

He sees how precarious your state of mind is and he sighs, because he’s utterly helpless, really, and the both of you know it.

“I understand,” is his quiet concession.

“No, you don’t,” you say, the words riding an exhaled defeat. “You’ll never know what it’s like, to– to like someone and know they’ll never like you back, and– because you’re not the kind of person who ever has a problem with people liking you, and– and to feel what I feel now, the humiliation and shame, no– no, Professor Lindisfarne, you’ll never understand that. I’m sorry. But you won’t. You can’t.”

“Now, that’s not true, Gyda,” and he forgets that he’s just addressed you by your first name. So much for boundaries. “That’s not fair for you to say. Of course I’ve suffered heartbreak before. We all have. Our hearts are part of what make us human. We’ve all had them broken.”

“Who could ever deny you?” you ask, seriously, and you don’t care how desperate and pleading it sounds– unbelievably desperate and pleading, incidentally, as if it was the last thing you’d ever say to him. But it’s important, it’s special, it’s something you may not ever have the chance to say again (since this meeting is all about establishing boundaries, and talking about Professor Lindisfarne’s romantic history is certainly counterintuitive to that goal). You’re overstepping your bounds but it’s worth it to see the look on his face.

“I– well, lots of people,” he stammers, a blush creeping onto his face (a blush that gives you an incredible amount of self satisfaction for putting it there). “But that isn’t the point.”

“Yes it is, it’s the total point,” you counter, somehow having the audacity to scoff. “For every one girl who has ever broken your heart, there are five more wanting to mend it. Don’t you understand? You don’t know what it’s like to not be wanted, because someone will always want you.”

“Well, I– frankly, this isn’t a discussion I should be having with a student. My personal life has no place at the university.” His hands are shaking, a light sheen of moisture collecting at his palms. He’s nervous, you notice, and you want to know why. You’re making him nervous.

“Sorry,” you offer, quickly, your heart rate increasing, your eyes fixed on his hands (what does it mean, that his hands are shaking, what does it mean, does it mean what you think it does, what you want it to, or– no, probably not, of course not, he couldn’t– but you still feel lightheaded, as if there are anvils in your eyelids and a balloon in your brain and a leaking sandbag clogging your arteries). You don’t want to leave, God, you don’t want to leave; you want to stay here forever because as soon as you leave that’s it, it’s over, the conversation is closed, and Professor Lindisfarne will shut you out of his life. No more private meetings, no more after class chats, no more witty emails. After you leave this office you won’t be special anymore. But maybe you were never really special to begin with.

“Gyda, I’m sorry, I really am. You’re a wonderful student and I like you. But perhaps we’ve been too friendly lately. I don’t want to– encourage you in any way. Do you understand?” Pause. He sees something. What does he see? Whatever it is, it prompts him to say, “Oh, Gyda, don’t– I’m sorry. I just don’t want to cause any more problems. It wouldn’t be fair to you.”

Oh, God. You’re crying. You only just now realize it. Why are you crying? Well, you know _why_ you’re crying, but– why, why, _why_ does it have to happen here, now? Why couldn’t you have held off until you got out of here? Sure, you’ve fantasized about him seeing you cry, about him holding you in his arms and kissing the tears from your face, but– but that’s not how this is going to end, and so you’re only just embarrassing yourself (as always, Bjorn would tell you). “No,” you say, hollowly, “no, I’m alright. I understand.”

It’s then that he sighs, drops his eyes to the sheet of paper on his desk; _your_ sheet of paper ( _ten_ sheets of paper, to be exact– you wonder if he got through all of them, or if he stopped midway, _disgusted_ by their content, but– oh, _disgusted_ is too harsh a word, it’s making the profusion of tears leaking from your eyes even harder to subdue).

“Look, I– Gyda,” he starts, shifting forward in his seat. He extends his hand, lays it flat, palm turned upward, toward you. You blink; your vision is still overpowered by the tears budding in your eyelids, and you’re afraid you’re hallucinating. Sniffling, you hazard a look at him, attempting to judge the meaning of this in his face. You see nothing, nothing but well practiced impassivity. When you reach forward, timidly, to rest your hand in his, blood rushes through you like a hurricane, and when your fingers touch, you swear you must be dead. “You will find someone,” he assures you, timorously but firmly at the same time, “it just can’t be me.” Then his left hand creeps up, joining the right, so that together his hands form a sort of parentheses around yours, blanketing your fingers (and so all of you, by extension) in a vaguely moist, sticky warmth that makes your insides bubble.

And then you stop breathing.

“Can’t?” you echo, faintly (can’t– or won’t?). “What does that mean?” you ask, half fearing the answer.

“ _Won’t_ , Gyda,” he iterates, faltering. “Not under any circumstances.”

“But if circumstances were different, you- "

“Best not to entertain hypotheticals, Gyda.”

“But you said ‘can’t.’ ‘Can’t’ is different than ‘won’t.’”

He’s still holding your hand, you realize (groggily, as if waking from a dream). Why is he still holding your hand?

“And you keep addressing me as Gyda instead of Miss Lothbrok. Professor, forgive me if I’m misinterpreting, but- "

“You _are_ misinterpreting, G– _Miss Lothbrok_.” Pause, inhale, swallow. “I think you should go now. And take your story with you. I don’t want to further violate your privacy.”

“You want me to leave,” you repeat.

“Yes, I think I’ve made that clear.”

“You’ll have to let go of my hand before I can do that, Professor.”

Because his grip on you has only tightened, subconsciously, and he wasn’t the least bit cognizant of it. After you’ve (cheekily) pointed it out, his body reacts as if struck by a high voltage of electricity, and he pulls back, looking anywhere but at you.

“I– I’m sorry,” he murmurs, abashed. “I– I forgot that we were– that I had– oh, for God’s _sake_ , Gyda– Miss Lothbrok– _please_ leave.” And this time, his inflection, it’s strained but venomous, and predatory, as if he’s holding back from striking his prey (his prey being you, you think, with a heady whoosh of– something– in your gut of guts). It’s as if it’s taking everything for him to hold back from striking. This time you know you aren’t imagining things. This time you know it’s real. What will happen, you wonder, if the prey strikes first?

“You like me,” you say, graced with some breed of audacity hitherto unknown to you. “I was right.” You’re the predator, now, and he is the prey. You have the power. You, red-cheeked from crying, red-eyed, red-nosed, red-lipped; a vision of red, the blood pooling, vibrating, beneath your skin, ready to rush to your head at any second. The adrenaline has made you bold. You stand, legs feeling boneless, and lean forward onto his desk. He’s dumbstruck, a deer in the headlights, the prey offering his last prayer as death stares him down from all too near a distance.

And then you’ve struck. Your lips to his– that’s the attack, the design, the hunt. And as his lips swell beneath yours, rise up to the challenge, you know you will not starve tonight. This prey, this victim, will be enough to sate you for the rest of your life.

Soon the hands that had before been clasping yours weave up to tangle through your hair, and you feel as if you might melt (because this is real, this is your story come to life, this is a waking dream, this is the beginning and end of everything you’ve ever hoped for).

“The door,” he moans, gruffly, into your ear, having moved his lips down your neck (and suddenly you are the prey once more, not even putting up a chase), “Gyda, lock the door.”

A spiral of lust roots itself in your lower abdomen and you extract yourself from the spider’s web just long enough to lock his office door. By the time you’ve locked it and turned around, he’s engulfed you, and your faces have merged to become one face, one breath, one desire, one flesh. Soon your knees buckle and you can no longer stand, the soft, sensitive tissue between your thighs prickling and thrumming and you’re gasping and you can’t breathe, you’re drowning, and he isn’t even _doing_ anything, he’s just holding you, stroking your back, running his tongue over your neck, and– _oh_ – one of his hands is under your shirt, and suddenly you’re tumbling to the ground and he’s catching you, and then suddenly he’s on top of you, and your legs are fast around his hips, tight and rigid as iron, and suddenly you’re tearing at his tie, and suddenly his hand splays over your mouth to shutter your moans, fearing they’ll be heard from the nearby offices of his colleagues.

The cross he wears around his neck dangles over your body now that his shirt is gone, a steadfast reminder of the sin you’re both committing, the passions of the flesh you’ve both decided to feed rather than abjure. You’re staring at it as it twists and spins with his every gesture; he notices, and without prelude wraps his fingers around the chain and rips it off his neck, tossing it somewhere– anywhere– else in the room.

And then, _oh_ – oh, _Lord_ , what is he doing? His lips are swirling around your nipple (you didn’t even notice your bra being undone, or your shirt coming off, for that matter– you’re so distracted by the ache between your legs), and you feel like this is it, this is the end, this is heaven, this is what _love_ is– stars exploding behind your eyes, fire and brimstone searing through your core, true and utter and incandescent ecstasy, the kind you have never even dreamed of feeling before, but now are abruptly feeling all at once.

“Shh,” he whispers into your ear, because you’re mewling and writhing underneath him with this _need_ that is distracting you from everything. You bite down on your lip (hard), and struggle to remain silent.

“Shh,” is the last thing you hear before your body dissolves into his; “shh,” is the last thing you hear before your life completes; “shh,” is the last thing you hear before you, yourself, Gyda Lothbrok, are gone– every shred of identity now forfeited, willingly, into Athelstan Lindisfarne’s lips.

“Shh,” and you disappear, because 

(establishing boundaries, in all fairness, has never been your forte).


End file.
